


Run. Don't look back.

by Fuinixe



Series: Febuwhump 2021 [15]
Category: The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: Alcoholic Booker | Sebastien le Livre, Gen, Genocide Mentions, M/M, Mentioned Anti-Semitism, Mission Fic, POV Andy | Andromache of Scythia, Post-World War II, Pre-Canon, Reacting to state-sponsored violence, Rescue Missions, Tired Andy | Andromache of Scythia, Trigger warning: mentions of ethnically motivated violence, holocaust mentions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-16
Updated: 2021-02-16
Packaged: 2021-03-18 01:48:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,068
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29481702
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fuinixe/pseuds/Fuinixe
Summary: Andy finds out the Soviet secret police in East Germany are already re-using the Nazi concentration camps.
Relationships: Andy & Joe & Nicky & Booker, Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova
Series: Febuwhump 2021 [15]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2143242
Comments: 2
Kudos: 32
Collections: febuwhump 2021





	Run. Don't look back.

20 March 1946  
Marthalen, Switzerland

Andy leaned against the front door to their safehouse to scrape the mud off her boots on the edge of the top step, but the mud stuck, stubbornly. _A little too on-the-nose_ , she mused to herself, cynically, and bent to unlace them instead. She didn’t tend to care much about dirt indoors, but the space she was sharing with the boys was small, and any courtesy would be repaid in Nicky’s warm smiles. Laces hanging, she tapped the cadence of their “all’s well” knock into the wood of the door before unlocking it, though she was sure Joe and Nicky already knew she was home. (Perhaps not Booker, for he’d been celebrating the end of the war with copious amounts of alcohol for oh, several months now.)

She stepped out of her shoes and into the safehouse, then turned around to bend over and smack her boots in the air together over the porch, then line them up side by side, out of the way of the next person to come out the door. She straightened up and shut the door firmly against the invading chill air.

Only then did she look around for the boys. Booker was on the couch, a beer stein in one hand and a novel in the other. Nicky was slouched in the arm chair, likewise reading, and gave her a little smile before sitting up to look around for his bookmark. Joe came in from the bedroom and headed straight for her to buss a kiss against her cheek. 

“How’s Dmitri?” he asked, inquiring after her contact.

Andy grimaced. This is why she’d been dragging her feet, somewhat literally, on her return to the safehouse. She’d promised them a full year off, after that horrid war, and it had only been ten months.

“Uh oh,” he said, mirroring her facial expression with an extra heaping of Joe flair, and took her coat to hang it up. “Bad news, then.”

She nodded dourly, then crossed over to the couch to shove Booker’s legs off it and steal a gulp of his drink. Joe went to perch on the arm of Nicky’s chair, and then all three men were regarding her intently. 

Andy scratched her ear and looked around the central room, taking in the cramped, grubby kitchen, the faded furniture, the soot-stained fireplace. It was dingy, but it was peaceful. “Fire’s getting low. How are we doing on wood?”

“You’re stalling, boss,” Booker pointed out, gently, and leaned in to steal his beer back. “What’s the deal with Dmitri?”

Andy sighed. “Dmitri’s fine, but I learned a whole lot about the Soviets that I wish I could un-learn.”

They waited, patiently, for a full minute, and then Joe prodded her. “What’s going on with the Soviets, Andy?”

She scrubbed a hand across her face. “Look, guys, I know I promised you a year off. I can probably take this one. You can meet me in Hamburg in a couple months.”

“Don’t be ridiculous, Andy,” Nicky chided. “Whatever this is, if it’s bothering you this much, we want to help you fight it.”

“I know you do. I know.” Andy drummed her fingers on her thigh. “The Soviets are setting up their own concentration camps.”

Booker scoffed with disgust. “Seriously?”

Andy’s leg started jiggling. “Yeah. Or, you know, in East Germany, just re-using the old ones. ‘Cause why waste effort when you’ve got a perfectly good camp sitting right there?”

Nicky was still watching her intently, impassive, but Joe was shaking his head, looking disgusted. Andy stood abruptly and rounded the couch to grab the full bottle of vodka she’d shoved into the back of one of the kitchen cabinets. She uncorked it and took a swig, then started pacing the small distance between the armchair and the door to the bedroom. 

“Who are they sending?” Booker asked. “Not Jews, one hopes?”

“No, not Jews. Criminals, some of ‘em, of course. Lotta political dissidents. Their own unwanted ethnicities. Poles, Greeks, Chinese. A _lot_ of Poles, apparently.”

“Sure,” Joe said, voice dripping with sarcasm. “Gotta keep all those terrible Poles under control.” 

“What is the job, Andy? Something specific?” Nicky asked.

“Seems like there’s a bunch of ‘dissident’ families that were deported from one village in particular, who snuck back across the border. Tried to stay long enough to get their valuables and bring in the harvest. They pressed their luck, stuck around for too long and got snitched on. Soviet secret police already sent all their kids to an orphanage. The adults are getting transported to the camp tomorrow.”

“Which camp?” asked Booker.

Andy paused her pacing and shook her head. “You guys aren’t going to believe this.” She took a long swallow of vodka. “Fucking Buchenwald.” The same place they’d helped liberate only eleven months prior.

“God _damn it!_ ” Joe snarled, clenching his fists. “ _Why_ are the mortals like this? Why do they all have to pull the same bullshit?”

Booker stood. “If this is happening tomorrow, we’d better get packing.”

“By train or by road?” Nicky asked. He and Joe also stood.

“Road. They’re moving them in vans, not train cars.” 

“Train would be simpler for us,” Booker pointed out.

Andy nodded. “I have a few contingency plans for a blockade, depending on how heavy traffic is. We’ll probably have to split up. Best case scenario is making it out there in time to steal some uniforms and some vans of our own.”

Joe and Booker disappeared into the bedroom to pack. Nicky placed a warm hand on her shoulder and peered into her eyes. “You did the right thing, telling us, boss.”

She smiled at him sadly. “I shouldn’t have even met with Dmitri before our break was up. I just didn’t think it would be this bad.”

“We’ll rest later, Andy,” Nicky said, as calm and confident as always. “We will.”

21 March 1946  
Pausa-Mühltroff, Germany

Booker and Joe had drawn as much attention up the road as they possibly could, with Nicky at a distance, picking off soldiers left and right. Andy’s job was simple: find any secret police who’d stayed in the vans with the prisoners. Kill them. Throw open the doors and point down the roadway back the way they’d came and tell the scared people inside:

“Run. Don’t look back.”

Deep, deep down, she wished she could follow her own advice.

**Author's Note:**

> First time writing Andy POV! Let me know what you think!


End file.
